Hopeful drops out of provost race

One of the five remaining candidates for the position of NIU provost revoked her application yesterday.

Norma Rees, acting chancellor at the University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee, has accepted a different position elsewhere, said Provost Search Committee Co-Chairman James Lankford.

However, Rees told Lankford she was “not at liberty ” to discuss any specifics of her new position.

Lankford said he did not know whether or not search committee members would find a replacement for Rees, but they might meet soon to discuss the possibility.

“Right now we are trying to cancel all the interviews for Rees,” he said.

Rees was scheduled to be on campus today and Friday to be interviewed by various university groups and to answer questions from university community members in an open forum.

One potential provost candidate, Mark Auburn, of the University of Arkansas, completed interviews Tuesday. Other candidates, Kendall Baker, of Bowling Green State University in Ohio, James Norris, NIU’s dean of the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences and Daniel Wit, NIU’s acting vice president and provost, will be interviewed within the next two weeks.